This study considers a contextualized approach to grammar instruction, asking: "Does embedded instruction using published authors as mentors improve grammar and usage for young writers?" Twenty-three students in one second-grade classroom participated. Students were taught grammar conventions through use of mentor texts for 45 minutes a…

This report describes the impact of the 2021 AISD multilingual summer school program on incoming kindergarten and 1st-grade emergent bilingual students' (N = 933) fall academic performance. Relative to matched comparison groups, students who attended summer school were significantly more likely to score on-track on TX-KEA in kindergarten. While…

Curriculum-based measures (CBMs) such as Word Identification Fluency promote student achievement, but because they are timed and administered frequently, they are prone to variation in student response styles. To study the impact of WIF response styles, we created and examined the validity of a novel response style measure and examined the degree…

Vocabulary skills are important for overall reading competence, but vocabulary assessment approaches that inform instructional decision-making and are sensitive to improvement are limited. This article describes a process for developing vocabulary measures designed to facilitate data-driven decision-making for kindergarten and first-grade students…

Personalized learning (PL) has been internationally promoted as a future direction of educational reform efforts. While there is growing evidence of PL enhancing learning outcomes, teachers reported having difficulty envisioning PL in practice. This national survey study investigated how PL is practiced in K-12 learner-centered schools in the U.S.…

Abundant empirical research points to a significant number of students not going to school across the United States. Further yet, there exists strong research consensus that absenteeism predicts negative and persistent academic outcomes for students. LEAs and related stakeholders have rightly adopted measurement and intervention on student…